It is well that the missionary and merchant have been and still are independent of the Turkish officials, for, with the ignorance of those in the interior and their readiness to play into the hands of every rival or persecuting agency, there would be constant liability to arrest, imprisonment, and even deportation. In spite of the extra-territorial laws, missionaries and merchants repeatedly have been put under arrest for imaginary charges, and otherwise officially annoyed. These difficulties have been met in quietness and overcome without loss of position or prestige. In no instance has a missionary been arrested for an actual crime or misdemeanor. The usual charge against them is that they are plotting against the government, and the officers make attempts to search their houses for documentary evidence and for arms. These various evidences of hostility have not seemed to strain the generally friendly relations existing between the missionaries and the local governments. Perhaps it should be stated here that all foreign capital invested in the country is held in the same way and has the same foreign protection. This is true of all Catholic institutions, Russian churches, monasteries, and schools, German orphanages, and mercantile warehouses, English residences, and stores,—everything that belongs to foreigners representing foreign capital is under foreign protection. At the same time it is recognized that the school, hospital, or church which occupies one of these foreign buildings is a foreign institution and as such has, according to the Turkish capitulations, special immunities and privileges. All dealings with the Turkish government, even to the present time, are based upon this supposition. This does not seem strange or unnatural to the Turkish government, which permits the English, German, French, Austrian, and other governments to have their own post-offices at Constantinople, Smyrna, and other ports, in which they sell only their own postage-stamps and conduct all the postal business they can procure. Under treaty rights above quoted, every concession or privilege granted by the sultan to the schools, churches, hospitals, or institutions belonging to England, France, Russia, or any other country, belongs by right to American institutions. The fact that America was discriminated against in this respect for many years, and that American institutions were thus deprived of privileges and concessions which had been conceded to similar institutions of several European powers, is well known, both at Constantinople, and in the United States. Happily these matters have now been adjusted.